One Way To Start the Apocalypse
by ShamelessOCcentricity
Summary: Supernatural, Torchwood, Merlin, Doctor Who, and Sherlock crossover set in Hogwarts. Uther Pendragon's unfair rule over Hogwarts is the least of his first year's students' problems, though he's certainly not helping them solve the pink witch's murder. Probably because the person animating homicidal statues is someone from his past, a crossroads demon named Nimueh.
1. Chapter 1

My hands were shaking as I climbed onto the train and looked around. There was so much noise, and everyone already seemed acquainted.

"Dean, I told you, I'm fine." Another first year said, pulling away from an older boy. They continued an argument in their American accents.

A pretty girl with black hair brushed past me, calling after a blonde boy. "You are such an idiot, Arthur!"

"_To Harry, from Clara, XXX. _Your father is obviously alive, because of the fresh alcohol stains on his trunk, but he's been given it to you, which means it's not being used by your father anymore. Why not? Because it's a gift from Clara, who's a long-standing romantic attachment given the age of the trunk and the three kisses; she's definitely not your mother, because you shows all the signs of having a long-since split family, which means it's a stepmother, and she's obviously gone. If she left him, he'd keep it. If he kicked her out, well, he'd get rid of her stuff—give it to you, for instance."

My head was hurting by the end of this little speech from a gangly dark-haired boy, given to a much shorter blonde boy carrying the trunk in question.

"THEO!"

I looked up at my name and saw Eva waving at me from inside one of the compartments. She beckoned me over to her, and I picked my way around a ginger Scottish girl who was dragging a boy along behind her with a sharp "_Ro_ry!" and made my way to her.

"Merlin's beard, Theo, I thought you'd gotten trampled for sure." She said. "Come on in; it's almost empty except for this Muggleborn bloke and a rather talkative painting that's going up in the school this year."

The boy in question was eyeing the painting suspiciously through a curtain of medium length hair.

"Trust me, you never really get used to it." I told him. My father's house had always sported the moving paintings and photographs that were commonplace in the Wizarding world, while at my mother's house the pictures stayed the same.

He looked up. "I'm Colin Caraway. You?"

"Theodora Miller. Call me Theo; Eve does. We grew up together. I'm a Halfblood, Mum kicked Dad out when she found out, but apparently I'm magic enough to be here. You're a Muggleborn?"

"Yep, resident Mudblood, that's me."

"Hello Theodora!" One of the men in the painting said, waving cheerfully. "My name is Sir Michael Sevenson, a knight errant; this is my squire, Fisk. Are you a first year at Hogwarts?"

"Yeah… Um, pleasure to meet you both. What's your story?"

"'Tis one of great adventures and amusing mishaps," Michael said.

"And a whole lot of stupidity," Fisk said in the background. "Seriously, it's unbelievable."

"We have time," I said, sitting down in front of the painting.

X-x-X-x-X

The groundskeeper, Mr. Rhys Williams, led us to the huge wooden doors, and his wife unlocked them for us to pour into the huge entrance hall.

"I'm Professor Song," A woman with curly blonde hair said as she swept into the room with a flutter of a green cloak, carrying a stool, "The deputy headmistress here. You will proceed to the front of the Great Hall and wait for your name to be called. Once it is, step forward and sit on the stool; I'll place the Sorting Hat upon your head and it will call out your House."

"Excuse me, River." The dark-haired girl from the train said. "Will you be calling me as Le Fay or Pendragon?"

"Le Fay."

"Oh, good." The blonde boy, Arthur, said quietly. She stomped backwards onto his foot.

"Come along," Song said, opening the doors to the Great Hall.

There were tons of people sitting silently, watching us all. "What if I'm a Squib?" I hissed to Eva.

She rolled her eyes. "What if you aren't?"

Before I could point out the fact that this was a terrible argument, the Hat began to sing.

I don't even remember the Sorting Hat's song. Something about time and fate and bonds never lost—I was too busy trying not to be ill.

"Adler, Irene."

An extraordinarily good-looking girl sauntered up to the stool and sat down carefully. The hat had barely reached her head when it called out, "SLYTHERIN!"

"Baxter, Freya."

A pretty girl with secondhand robes walked over next. "GRYFFINDOR!"

"Caraway, Colin."

"Good luck!" I hissed to him.

He nodded thanks with a, "Yo."

"RAVENCLAW!"

Colin went to sit down with the quiet intellectuals, looking unsurprised, and greeted them casually.

"Never would've guessed that one," Eva whispered as someone named Estella Cigam was put into Slytherin after a very long deliberation on hat's part.

"Cormac, Eva."

"Merlin's pants…" She muttered.

I hugged her and then shoved her along to sit on the stool. After a few moments in which I crossed my fingers and prayed she'd be in my house, "HUFFLEPUFF!"

She stood up and heaved a sigh of relief, setting the hat back down. Her entire family had been in Hufflepuff, and they were all really nice people, but her little brothers would never have let live it down had she been Sorted elsewhere.

A nervous looking boy named Lancelot Du Lac joined her a moment later, and then someone named William Ealdor was called up.

"Oh no," His small dark-haired friend breathed.

I smiled sympathetically. "You next?"

"Yeah."

"I'm Theo."

"Merlin."

"Good luck."

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

William went to sit by Eva and Lancelot, flashing Merlin a thumbs up as he went.

"Emrys, Merlin."

The hat barely brushed his dark hair when—"GRYFFINDOR!"

"Finnegan, Tarquinia" became a Gryffindor after a fierce whispered argument with the hat. Morguase Gorlois was almost immediately a Slytherin.

Then came the gangly boy from the train, who was still standing with the blonde. "Holmes, Sherlock."

"Not Ravenclaw," He mouthed silently.

I wondered what was wrong with Ravenclaw—I'd always heard from my father that if I couldn't make it into Gryffindor (like him), Ravenclaw was the next best thing—as he was eventually sorted into Slytherin.

Molly Hooper, a mousy girl who was literally shaking as her name was called, became a Ravenclaw herself, along with Martha Jones. They quickly turned to conversation with one another in the sea of bronze and blue.

Then the girl, Morgana, who'd asked the question of her last name was called forward, and I gulped as I remembered that she was Le Fay, and I'm Miller. "SLYTHERIN!"

She glanced around at the Headmaster as she stood up—I looked too and saw him lost in consternation. My letter had said _Uther Pendragon_ was the headmaster; was she his daughter? Stepdaughter?

As I studied him, I missed Professor Song calling my name, and only noticed when a young professor wearing a suit and tie (very Muggle articles of clothing, mind) caught my eye and nodded to the stool.

"Oh!" I said, and Professor Song rolled her eyes.

I rushed over to sit down amid the laughter of the other students, grinning good-naturedly. Eva did an exaggerated facepalm, and Colin was laughing hysterically with the quiet Ravenclaws.

Then I was distracted by a whispering in my head. "Oh, aren't you the enigma? Where to put you, where to _put_ you… Cleverer than most, but willing to help. Not afraid of danger, but of failure—so very ambitious… Best be RAVENCLAW!"

I stood up then, I suppose, but hardly remember anything of the walk to the table where I sat on the bench beside Colin. He high-fived me. "Longest yet! What did you say?"

"Nothing." I replied quietly. "He just talked."

"Really? We had a conversation."

"Sh!" A slightly overweight boy said sharply.

"Who's being sorted?" I asked the girl beside me, Martha Jones. "I can't see—too short."

"Gwaine Moon is a Gryffindor, and Sebastian Moran is still—"

"SLYTHERIN!"

"Slytherin," She completed.

"Moriarty, James."

A pale boy made his way to the chair, and the hat hadn't even touched his head when it yelled, "SLYTHERIN!" for him as well.

Next was an auburn girl named Donna Noble, and after a moment she was made a Gryffindor.

"Pendragon, Arthur" was the blonde boy, apparently the headmaster's son, and he was a Gryffindor too. In fact, the next girl—the ginger Scot from the train, Amelia Pond—was a Gryffindor too.

Oddly enough, the next four people were Hufflepuffs: Kitty Riley, Mickey Smith, Guinevere Thompson, and Rose Tyler.

"Watson, John!"

This was the short blonde boy.

"That's the bloke who was with—oh, what was his name—Sherlock! Sherlock Holmes." I whispered to Colin.

The overweight Ravenclaw who'd shushed me looked up at the blonde with a sudden interest. "He was with Sherlock?" He asked me.

"Yeah, they sat together, Sherlock was figuring stuff out about him based on his trunk." Then something clicked. "Oh! You're the reason he didn't want to be in Ravenclaw! Are you family?"

"He's my brother. My name is Mycroft Holmes."

"GRYFFINDOR!"

"Williams, Rory." Professor Song continued, pausing to smile at this boy.

"RAVENCLAW!"

We all clapped for him as he made his way over to our table. He sat down beside me. "Hi." Rory whispered, looking over at the Scottish girl from the train, who was already laughing with another Gryffindor girl.

"I'm Theo, this is Colin. My best friend's in Hufflepuff—is Amelia a friend of yours?"

"Yeah," He said. "I knew she'd be in a different House. I thought for sure I'd be a Hufflepuff, but I always knew she'd be a Gryffindor."

"Winchester, Sam."

"RAVENCLAW!"

Professor Song rolled up the parchment and returned to the staff table.

Sam sat between Molly and Mycroft, introducing himself quickly before falling silent for the headmaster.


	2. Chapter 2

"Welcome, new students, and welcome back older students! This school will be your home for the next nine months; I hope you will enjoy your time here. However," Here, his voice hardened, and I saw again the shadow I'd noticed when Morgana became a Slytherin.

"There's always a however," Colin muttered.

"We will not permit the use of magic outside classes. Anyone caught practicing magic beyond a Hogwarts sanctioned class will be punished severely. Duelling will be punished by expulsion."

"Duel tonight?" Colin said. "I think yes."

We high-fived again and were rewarded by a dark glare from that Mycroft bloke as we dissolved into silent laughter, which only served to make me laugh harder. He simply doesn't look very scary.

"Our caretaker, Mr. Nott, asks that you keep the corridors clean and free of prank store products. Otherwise, we have no announcements. I hope you enjoy your feast."

Food appeared on gleaming plates, and Colin leaned forward. "Hi, I'm Colin. What was your name again?"

Sam looked up in surprise. "Oh, Sam Winchester."

"Really? You look like a Tobias."

I scoffed as I heaped mashed potatoes onto my plate. "Don't listen to him, Sam. He reckons I look like a Caroline. What house is Dean in, by the way? He's your brother, right?"

"Uh, yeah—he's a second year Gryffindor—how'd you know that?"

"I have three siblings, and I saw you two arguing on the train. 2 plus 2 equals 4."

"Not the best example of deductive reasoning, but I suppose you're adequate in regards to reaching the correct conclusion," Mycroft observed, managing to sound incredibly condescending even when it was a twisted sort of compliment.

"Shut up," Colin, Sam, and I said.

I glanced at his plate and realised he wasn't eating. "Come on, Mycroft, even you can't be too posh for Hogwarts food. Eat something—maybe you'll stop being such a git then."

"The amount of fat in this food—" He began, but was cut off by Colin standing up and shoving a roll in his mouth. "Mmffgg!"

"Fifteen's too young to be panicking over your weight," Martha Jones added.

I propped my elbows up on the table and studied the professor in the bowtie. "Does anyone know that Professor? With the Muggle clothing, the really young one?"

"That's the Doctor," Mycroft said when he finished chewing. "He teaches Defence Against the Dark Arts."

"Doctor who?" Sam rejoined.

Mycroft shrugged. "Just the Doctor. Not Professor or anything—I don't think anyone knows his name."

"What's Professor Song teach?" Colin asked.

"Transfiguration."

He grinned. "She's not half bad looking."

I elbowed him sharply, not particularly needing to picture my professors as attractive. "What's Pendragon like?" I asked Mycroft, nodding to the headmaster.

"Don't break his rules," Mycroft replied quite simply. "He doesn't joke around, and his punishment methods aren't exactly _legal_. He has connections in every department in the Ministry, and more wealth and prestige than any wizard in the world."

All of us first years fell silent and looked around at each other in unease. "That doesn't sound good," I managed finally. "Why is he Headmaster?"

"His wife died in the War. I think he just wants to make sure no one else dies because of someone like Tom Riddle."

"There are better ways," Sam muttered.

"You would know," Mycroft retorted.

Martha jumped in quite tactfully then, steering the conversation to the other Professors; I learned that Professor Harkness was the Charms teacher, Professor Jones taught the now-mandatory Muggle Studies, Professor Harper was Potions, Professor Gaius taught Herbology, Professor Sato was Arithmancy, Madame Hudson was the school nurse, some bloke called the Master taught Astronomy, Professor Cooper-Williams—that was the groundskeeper's wife—taught Care of Magical Creatures, Professor Monmouth was the History of Magic teacher, and Professor Smith was the Ancient Runes teacher.

"Who's the Quidditch coach?" Sam asked eagerly.

"Mr. Owens—though he prefers Craig, rather unprofessionally."

X-x-X-x-X

The very next morning, we were given our schedules. "Dammit!" I hissed. We didn't have anything with Hufflepuffs today, just one Double Defence Against the Dark Arts with Gryffindor and Herbology with Slytherin—plus Transfiguration on our own.

"Do look after my brother," Mycroft said lazily as I tucked into beans-and-toast.

I looked up in surprise. "What? Me?"

"You do appear the most competent out of this bunch—though admittedly, that isn't saying much."

Martha scowled at him and Sam looked offended, but Molly just shrunk away and Colin actually laughed. I gaped at him, not really sure whether to be offended or flattered myself. I decided to hide behind my goblet of pumpkin juice instead.

"He'll likely try to get a hold of poisonous herbs," Mycroft continued. "Try to make sure he doesn't, to the best of your ability?"

"Oh, shut up and find some cake," Colin said easily as he loaded his plate with bacon.

I inhaled pumpkin juice and came up spluttering. I'd learned from Molly Hooper last night what the funny badge on his robes meant. "You can't address a prefect like that!" Or, as it came out, "Yacantdresspreftlikeat."

"How eloquent," Mycroft said in faint amusement.

Colin made a crude gesture around the fork in his hand. Mycroft replied by implying the other boy hadn't evolved much further than Neanderthal status. Sam snapped something at Mycroft.

"If you are all going to be gits, I'm going to visit the boys before class," I said sharply, pushing my food away and stalking off with my bag.

Molly caught up a moment later. "Hey," She said.

"Hullo."

"Who are you visiting?"

"Oh! It's this painting of a knight and his squire—they're pretty funny."

"How do you know this already?" She asked.

"Oh, it's new, so they shoved it on the train and we ended sitting with it—me, Eva, and Colin, that is. I reckon you'll like Eva. She's probably whipping those Hufflepuffs into a proper House right now, instead of the awkward oh-we're-nice-don't-mind-us Hufflepuff of old."

"She sounds kind of scary."

I laughed and patted her on the shoulder. "No scarier than me."

"Kind of my point," Molly replied, offering me a grin.

We dissolved into laughter just as Pendragon swept into the room. He nearly ran into us, and then stopped and peered down. "Oh, hello. Where are you two going?" He asked.

"Um… We… Uh…"

"Well, you see, there's this painting…"

"She met it on the train—well, I mean, not _met_, but since they move…"

"I was going to see it and she came along…"

"So, yeah."

"You mean the painting of Sir Michael and Master Fisk?"

"Yeah!" I said, seizing on it like a lifeline.

He nodded in appreciation. "That is one of my favourite paintings. We introduced several this year. And girls? Do stay out of trouble," He told us sternly, before leaving.

Molly clutched my arm. "Blimey, he terrifies me."

"Me too," I admitted. "Me too…"


	3. Chapter 3

"Hullo, ladies. Done quibbling?" I asked, sliding onto the bench between Colin and Sam. Colin made a rude gesture tempered by a grin.

"Sorry," Sam said sheepishly. "Mycroft just really gets under my skin, you know? Swear it won't happen again."

I rolled my eyes and clapped him on the shoulder. "It's alright, mate. So, must be a pretty drastic change, moving to England and then coming to Hogwarts? Did you know you were a wizard?"

"Hard not to," Sam responded darkly. "My father was big on making sure we knew everything about keeping ourselves safe if there's ever another war—he only moved to America when Mum got pregnant with me. Actually, this class will probably be a review."

"Ooh, I hope not! Reviews are boring!"

We all jumped at that. The Doctor bloke, our professor, was standing right behind us with a huge, daft grin on his face. "Hi, I'm the Doctor!"

"Bloody _hell_," Colin muttered.

"Good morning, sir." I said politely, stomping on Colin's foot. "What _will_ we be studying in class?"

"I was going to spend the first half of it making sure you all get to know one another. Inter-House rivalry is pointless and rather stupid, don't you agree? So very _human_. You're all _brilliant_, so why fight so much?"

"Sir… Aren't you human?" Martha Jones asked.

"I'm a Time Lord," He replied happily.

There was a quiet scoffing noise, and the entire room turned to stare at the Gryffindor girl responsible. "Time Lords are a bedtime story. They died out centuries ago, in the Great Purge. Azazel and his demons destroyed them, at cost of their own existence." She explained.

"Well, that's a lovely bedtime story," Colin muttered.

"I heard much the same growing up," Sam agreed, meeting the girl's eyes. "I'm Sam, by the way."

"Quinn," She smiled.

"Yes, well, some of us escaped," The Doctor said.

"It's true," Arthur Pendragon added. "Father insisted that we get the Time Lords to work for Hogwarts."

"Smarmy pureblood gits," Quinn retorted.

The pale boy sitting beside her laughed quietly—Merlin; I remembered him from the Sorting.

"Shut up, _Mer_lin." Arthur snapped.

"Forget _inter_-House rivalry," Martha said. "They're going to kill one another all by themselves."

"Sorry," A short blonde Gryffindor boy said slowly, "What's a Time Lord?"

"Someone explain it to the muggleborn," Arthur said dismissively.

"Oi!" A redheaded Gryffindor girl said sharply. She sounded rather Welsh, and high pitched. "You say that like it's a bad thing, blondie!"

"I vote we lock all the Gryffindors in a room and see who comes out alive," Colin said.

"My money's on Quinn," I offered.

Quinn looked surprised. "Really?"

"You've challenged both the headmaster's son and the professor in the past five minutes alone."

She shook her head and pointed to the blonde muggleborn boy from Gryffindor. "John would win. He's like a tiny little ball of evil." She assured me.

"I'm not tiny!" John snapped.

I had to agree—he was my height, after all. "Maybe you, John, and… Sorry, what's your name?"

"Donna. Donna Noble," The ginger Welsh muggleborn said.

"Quinn, John, and Donna," I said firmly.

The Doctor had gotten rather involved in listening to our conversation, and finally seemed to remember he's supposed to be teaching us, because he jumped a little and regained our attention.

"Well, I'm going to team you up and teach you the most basic defence spell—_well_, the most useful basic defence spell—which disarms people. It's really good, because humans sometimes try to hex first and ask questions later."

"You mean _expelliarmus_?" Sam said. "Isn't that a bit dangerous? It can really cause damage if someone gets thrown back."

He shrugged out of his brown coat and threw it over his desk, then pulled a strange looking wand and waved it around. The desks disappeared, replaced by cushions.

"Merlin's pants!" I squeaked, then glanced apologetically at Merlin. "No offence," I added.

"None taken. Mum says it a lot, though usually in reference to the laundry."

Everyone dissolved into laughter, even Arthur Pendragon.

"See? Cushions make everything better. _Well_, unless you're a transitive shape multiform. Okay! Rory Williams and Molly Hooper, you two work together. Amelia Pond and Sam Winchester. Martha Jones and Gwaine Moon. Tarquinia Finnegan—"

"Quinn!" Quinn piped up.

"_Quinn_ Finnegan and Colin Caraway. Theodora Miller and Merlin Emrys. Arthur Pendragon and Donna Noble."

I crossed the room to smile at Merlin shyly.

"Right, everyone! The spell is _expelliarmus_. Ex_pell_iarmus. Expelli_arm_us."

"We get it!" Quinn said, and we all laughed again.

The Doctor sniffed and straightened his well-fitting blazer. "Well," He said. "Go on, try waving your wands, say it. It'll take a few tries."

I turned to Merlin. "Ladies first," He said hastily.

Grinning, I shook my head. "Sorry, mate. Purebloods go first."

"Expelliarmus," Merlin tried half-heartedly.

"Come on, mate, you're brilliant. Just put some feeling into it!"

He shrugged. "It seems a bit useless, saying incantations."

"Why's that?" I asked, confused. Merlin sighed, tucked his wand in his back pocket, and lifted his hand. "Merlin—"

I was cut off rather abruptly when I was tossed backwards like a ragdoll. My wand flew from my hand and landed at least 3 metres away, at the Doctor's feet. He looked down, then at me, and finally his gaze came to rest on Merlin.

"What?" He said, shocked.

Merlin shuffled his feet awkwardly. "Yeah…"

"_What?_" The Doctor repeated. "_WHAT?_"

"I can do magic without a wand or words. Have done since I was a baby—I just can."

"That's impossible," The Doctor breathed.

Quinn snorted. "Bit rich, coming from a bleedin' Time Lord."

"I'm good with the whole Time Lord thing, but warlocks are a myth," Arthur said.

"Sh, sh, shh." The Doctor snapped. "Merlin, did you incant a spell in your mind? When did you come to be able to do that outside times of dire need? How long did you say you've been able to do this? Have you ever studied silent spell-casting?"

"No, when I was seven, my whole life, and no." Merlin said, ticking them off a mental list. I'm only a Halfblood, but even I whistled long and low in appreciation. That takes some serious inherit ability.

Sam turned away from Quinn and stared at Merlin. "Was your father a warlock? What do your parents do?"

"We raise dragons… Legally!" He added, when Arthur started to say something. "It's one of the last dragon reservations in Wales."

"Dragon Lord," The Doctor breathed. "You're the son of a Dragon Lord! I've always wanted to meet a Dragon Lord!"

"You're such a _girl_," Arthur said, rolling his eyes.

"Do you mind me asking—what's it like, being around dragons?" Molly asked.

"It's brilliant. My favourite one is a Hungarian Horntail, kind of a gold colour, named Kilgharrah. He's watching this egg—on of the last of the Frost Dragon eggs in the world. We're pretty good friends, I guess, but he can be rude."

"You can talk to dragons?" I gasped.

He shrugged, self-deprecatingly. "It's genetic."

"Dragon Lords, Time Lords, we get it, you're ah-mazing. Can you teach us how to defend ourselves now?" Donna interrupted.

Even the Doctor joined in the laughter this time.


	4. Chapter 4

I found myself paired up with Molly Hooper after the fifth time someone was thrown across the room by someone who knew more magic than the other—Merlin and the Doctor were having a practice duel while Arthur and Quinn kept disarming one another at the same time, which made Arthur grow more and more frustrated while Quinn laughed. This wasn't aided by Gwaine, who would disarm Arthur from behind every time he fetched his wand.

Molly and I had pretty much accepted that she was too frightened of hurting me to actually pull off the spell, and I managed to fling her wand into people's eyes whenever I practiced, so we just sat down and watched.

Donna and Martha were giggling more than casting spells. "I just hit _Arthur_ in the _face_!"

"Sam and Amelia seem really close," Rory told Colin. "I just don't trust him."

"Rory's so sweet, to be worried about his friend," Molly said.

"Jealous, more like." I replied. "Rory's probably got it all planned out that he's going to marry Amelia Pond one day, and now he has to consider the fact that proposals made on playgrounds don't hold up in real life."

"How do you know?" Molly asked.

I shrugged. "My mum and dad grew up together. It was a really cute story, how they found each other when they were nineteen, but when she found out he was a wizard, they got divorced. I had to move to Dad's place when she realised I was a witch. My aunt tried exorcising me."

"I'm sorry," She offered.

"Nah, don't be. What do you think you're going to do when we leave Hogwarts, Molly Hooper?"

"I want to be a Healer at St. Mungo's. What about you?"

"I want to teach here. I don't ever want to leave this place—I grew up hearing stories about it, and my Dad used to take me on holiday to Hogsmeade."

Molly is a Halfblood too, but her dad knew her mum was a witch and even studied up on it. He got quite good with potion making, which requires very little magic, and her mum did all that. She'd told me this shortly before I collapsed onto the four poster beds with the blue drapes and fell asleep.

"That sounds lovely."

I hummed in agreement, ducking Arthur's wand as it soared across the room again.

X-x-X-x-X

I fell into step beside Sam as we headed towards the Transfiguration classroom. "Song scares me," I muttered.

He nodded. "She seems to know Rory, too. Hey, Rory!"

"What?" Rory asked, spinning around rather quickly.

"Do you know Professor Song at all?"

"No," He said. "Honestly, she kind of scares me."

"Agreed," I said.

"Maybe we're overreacting…" Molly offered. After a moment, she shook her head. "She's scary, isn't she?"

We all fell silent and ducked into a smaller corridor as a small cluster of adults swept past. They all seemed to be pretty posh Ministry wizards, led by Pendragon, who was being quite friendly with a Ministry witch in a pink outfit. Seriously, a _lot_ of pink.

"Huh," Sam said when we were out of earshot. "Looks like Arthur might just get a new stepmother."

"A very pink stepmother," Molly giggled.

"I wouldn't imagine it would be quite so lasting," I replied.

They all turned to stare at me.

"Because she's already wearing a wedding ring…?" I said, feeling awkward. "It's not very clean or anything, but it's clearly still in use. If she wanted to meet a new husband, she wouldn't still be wearing it."

"Oh, blimey, I didn't even notice that." Sam said.

I grinned. "Blimey? We'll make a Brit out of you yet, Winchester." Everyone dissolved into helpless giggles again.

When we recovered, I checked our schedule and glanced around at the small corridor. "Um, guys? I think we're lost."

"Really?" Rory asked, sounding a bit more than suitably concerned.

"Yeah, I think we took a wrong turning, or maybe a staircase moved, because this is near the Headmaster's wing. Where Arthur, Morgana, and Pendragon live during the summer—that way must be the meeting rooms."

"Wonder why they're meeting?" Sam asked, a slow grin spreading across his face.

"You can't be serious," Molly said, clapping her hands to her mouth. "We can't eavesdrop on them!"

"Well, I don't know about you guys, but I trust that guy about as far as I can throw him—without magic, that is. I think he's working on the Wand Watch Act." Sam said.

"No!" Molly gasped.

"It makes sense. He's obsessed with preventing another Wizarding War—imagine what he'd do to make sure that every usage of Dark Magic was flagged and investigated by the Ministry? And sure, that sounds great, until they start monitoring other things. They could make laws on what we're allowed to enchant, read letters we write using spells…"

We all fell silent at the picture Sam painted with his words. I'd gone to Muggle primary school and knew a few things about fascism—I read ahead in my textbooks. Uther Pendragon was clever and twisted enough to make it work. He could be worse, far worse, than Voldemort if he went wrong.

"And what do you suppose we do if he is?" I hissed. "Alert the press?"

"My Dad is an Auror. He'd think of some reason to have him watched. The Auror Office is slowly pulling away from the Ministry."

I frowned. The Auror Office and the Ministry were pulling apart, the Gryffindors were fighting among themselves, and one man, one twisted man, had far too much power for any one person.

"Do you get the feeling this is just the beginning of something more?" I asked.

The others stared at me. "Uh, no?" Rory said.

"Yes," Sam answered, his gaze appraising and shadowed. "I do."

I shivered.

X-x-X-x-X

We made it to the Transfiguration room almost twenty minutes late, wide-eyed and suitably abashed. "Sorry, Professor Song! We ended up on the other side of the castle, I don't even know _how_," I was rambling, but couldn't really stop. "Like, one minute we were on the right track, the next we found ourselves in the west wing. I think a staircase moved."

"We've just been discussing your first class," Song replied, her gaze flitting over us before landing on Rory. "I heard you six met the Doctor."

"Yep," Sam said easily, sitting down.

"The Gryffindors nearly killed one another," I added.

She smiled. "Well, I'm glad you six are getting on. After all, I am your Head of House, and the Headmaster holds me personally responsible for keeping you out of trouble."

"Pendragon wouldn't challenge you," Rory replied.

Song laughed aloud. "He might try." She said, sounding both amused and ominous at once. I was impressed.

"Anyway, we should really get to work. Transfiguration is a delicate subject…"


End file.
